What do you call yourself, freelancer?

By Jake Poinier

What’s in a name? When it comes to freelancing, I’d argue: A lot.

What to call ourselves is a matter of frequent and sometimes heated debate on LinkedIn, as Planet Word brought up in a post today, “Are you a consultant or a freelancer?” My first recognition that “freelancer” isn’t always the best word to use was back when I first read Peter Bowerman’s The Well-Fed Writer back in 2001. He uses “commercial writer,” which is a useful distinction, particularly for those of us who focus on business writing rather than exclusively writing for publications.

The problem is, “freelance” can carry some negative connotations—fly-by-night, can’t get a real job, in-between-jobs—and I’ve learned over the years that there’s a benefit to using the right phrase at the right time. Here’s how my thought process has evolved:

• Freelancer (or freelance writer and editor) is reserved for when I’m talking to people within the industry: graphic designers, web designers, ad agencies, magazine editors and other people who are hip to the concept. It’s useful shorthand, and immediately implies “I’m for hire.”
• I’ll use commercial writer or corporate copywriter if I’m talking to someone who’s in a business field. For example, a marketing director or business owner that I’m confident has some experience in marketing/advertising, but might be wary of (i.e., may have had a bad experience with) freelancers.
• Finally, when I’m talking to someone who might not be familiar with the creative industry, lately I’ve been using a complete phrase: “I run an editorial services firm.” I find that it puffs things up a bit, and will usually provoke a follow-up question.
• Personally, I never use consultant. I suppose there might be a circumstance I’d use it someday, but I haven’t come across it yet.

So….what’s your favorite term for describing what you do? Please share your ideas in the comments!

Jake dispenses business prescriptions for freelancers at DearDrFreelance.com—no matter what you want to call yourself.

Freelance Travel and the Perils of Being a Road Warrior

I’m sitting in a hotel room in Pennsylvania watching a news report about a situation I just missed–the bomb squad was called out in Pittsburgh after a suspicious package was discovered somewhere in the city. I shudder to think of what might have happened to my deadlines if I had gotten caught in a horrific traffic snarl that probably followed. But that’s not among the perils of being a freelance road warrior I’m thinking of…

I knew this week that the second I pulled out of the driveway to go on my Chicago to New York City road trip, I’d get hit six ways from Sunday with things I had hoped to avoid dealing with until I got back. Freelance-Zone.com got several requests from potential sponsors for rate cards and other information, an interview I’d been waiting on finally came in from the cold, and I even got an offer for some additional freelance work writing copy for one of my previous clients.

Naturally all this stuff came in when I was in no-signal areas, doing my travel reviews of record stores and restaurants, or trying to write up material to make deadline for the clients that I did NOT put on hold during all of this travel and discovery.

23 record stores later, I am still trying to catch up with all the e-mails and requests for my time. And I’m STILL on the road!

The perils of freelancing from the road range from the mundane–trying to get a seat in a coffee shop next to an outlet so you can deal with a dying laptop battery and make deadline…to the serious–trying to avoid having my travel budget dinged by gotcha charges, excessive fees and highway tolls and other expenses.

Lessons learned?

Essential road warrior gear for freelancers should include a wireless headset for your cell phone, a spare battery for your laptop, and a cell phone capable of using Google Maps with the Location Services feature. I can’t tell you how many times I would have gotten hopelessly lost without the Location Services function of the iPhone displaying the little blue dot telling me exactly where I was on both my route AND in terms of the directions I had gotten from Google Maps. On or off track, the little blue dot tells all and it shows you in SECONDS whether you’ve zigged when you should have zagged.

I’ll do a complete post on essential freelance travel gear later, but for now, suffice it to say that you should always expect your battery to die when you need it most, you should always count on getting lost just when you NEED to be in a certain town on time, and never make plans to stay longer than absolutely necessary—you’ll find a way to need to be someplace else on that day you were planning to sleep in. … Continue Reading

Freelance Travel–Beware The “Gotcha” Clause

by Joe Wallace

I am still freelancing on the road–I’m filing reports this week from all over the place. Yesterday was New York, today it’s Pittsburgh, tomorrow, who knows? It all depends on the road and how good it is to me. Today I had trouble getting my clients their daily dose of freelance deliverables because of another unexpected wrinkle–did you know Starbucks in those truck driver rest stop areas don’t always carry wi-fi? I thought the whole idea behind the success of Starbucks was standardization…but apparently not.

All was well that ended well, as I managed to meet my deadlines by stopping off in a local bar and grill in Pittsburgh before time ran out, but there’s another assumption that’s not safe to make as a road warrior–even the most (recently) dependable sources of free wi-fi can’t be depended upon for one reason or another.

But there’s a much more important issue I want to discuss today–the detestable business practice known as the “gotcha” fee. What’s a gotcha fee? Glad you asked… … Continue Reading

A Freelance Travel Writing Experiment

by Joe Wallace

I love travel, and I love travel writing. So why haven’t I done that much in 2010? Because I let myself get tied down to a freelance gig that required me to show up onsite several days a week or take meetings that tied me to the company’s secure site which was tricky to access even ONSITE.

So I wound up being tied to a desk. It was worth it financially–I built up my war chest and was able to finish the project, choose not to renew with that client and concentrate on my own work after the project was done.

And now I’m taking full advantage by doing some travel and travel blogging.

Specifically, I’m doing a cross country trek to blog about indie record stores between Chicago, Illinois and New York City. It’s called Vinyl Road Rage, and I’m taking a dozen days on the road, blogging the whole way for Turntabling.net.

But I’ll also be posting along the way for Freelance-Zone.com because the issues I’ll be facing on the road are travel writing issues. How do I connect on the road? How do I juggle my travel with my other clients–who I won’t be putting on hold during the trip? How will THAT work out? I will give reports along the way about the trials, tribulations, almost-busted deadlines and much more.

After all, the idea of being a freelancer is being FREE. If I’m true to the freelance ideal, I should be able to travel for nearly two weeks, make my freelance clients happy AND post about it all here…right? Let’s take this journey together and see what happens. My road trip begins today, Thursday August 12, 2010…time to hit the road!

–Joe Wallace

Does Your Hobby Blog Eclipse Your Pro Blog?

by Joe Wallace

If your hobby blog is overtaking your professional blog, getting more hits and more attention, ask yourself a couple of important questions. After all, we all want our pro blogs to do well and make money–but some people find their pro blogs lagging behind the ones they do for fun.

And there lies the answer, I suspect.

Hobby blogs are often more informal, more fun to read, and definitely more fun to write than pro blogs. I think pro blogs could take a lesson here–at least the ones that don’t seem to be able to compete. I run Turntabling.net, which is a lot more snarky, informal and goofy than Freelance-Zone.com. While Turntabling isn’t a hobby blog per se–I do try to earn some coin on it–I don’t worry nearly as much about content there because it’s far more opinionated and as such is easier to write. While there are opinions here, I find striking a balance between information and opinion more crucial to the success of FZ in general.

If your hobby blog is outpacing your pro blog, ask a few questions of your work:

• What makes the hobby blog fun to read? What is it you do there that you DON’T do on the pro blog?
• Is your pro blogging work too long? Too densely packed with information? Or is it “skimmable”?
• What is the central idea of your pro blog? Can you sum it up in two sentences or less?
• Look at the visual presentation of your pro blog. Is it easy on the eyes? Or is it a cluttery mess?
• Give your blog the Who Cares? test for all your most recent posts. The So What? test is also a good one.

These are only a few of the things you can try, I’ll cover some additional ways to give your pro blog a good, hard look in another post. … Continue Reading

Freelance Opportunities…at Starbucks

Wired reports on an interesting development that means more freelance opportunities at Starbucks. And possibly WITH Starbucks.

In the last few years, unless you have an AT&T account or purchase and use a Starbucks gift card, there was no such thing as a publicly available wi-fi signal at the famous coffee shop chain. iPhone users could happily freelance away thanks to their AT&T mobile login, but the rest of the freelancers had to make do some other way.

But Starbucks has finally realized what all those people typing away furiously at their Macs and Windows laptops REALLY want from Starbucks aside from those high-calorie pastries and pricey lattes. A place to get stuff done–an office away from home. One that has music that won’t make you run screaming for the earplugs (except when they play that Paul McCartney album AGAIN for the millionth time.)

According to Wired, “Starting July 1, Starbucks will let anyone connect to its WiFi network for free. This fall, the company will add a content network called Starbucks Digital Network, in partnership with Yahoo and other sites, which will include local content you won’t be able to read anywhere else. Both offerings will be free.”

The Freelancer’s Friend

Magazines like MacLife, PC, Wired, and other tech-oriented titles can be a freelancer’s best friend. How many times have you stared down the aisles at your local Best Buy or Apple Store, bewildered at the range of prices, models, and formats wondering how to make the leap?

It’s not just computers, either. External hard drives, wireless routers, even CD-R and DVD-Rs have so many choices it’s difficult to know where to start. That’s where the tech mags come in. There’s nothing better than reading a side-by-side comparison of the latest laptops, wi-fi gear, and software; the sections these mags provide on tweaking and upgrading your existing gear? Priceless.

MacLife is, for the Apple newcomer, one of the best you can buy. The magazine is NOT written for people who already know everything about their Mac. It assumes there are entry-level readers AND more experienced tech-heads in the subscriber list. If only more magazines followed this example!

PC Magazine is a great destination for the PC user, with “roundup” type comparisons and an excellent downloads section that can have you tweaked and running more efficiently in no time. Maximum PC comes a close second, valuable for how-tos for security, work-related issues, and just plain utilitarian things like recovering from a soda spill.

Freelancers who feel lost in the world of computer jargon, installation details and other issues will do themselves a big favor by adding these sites to their favorites list.

How To Start Freelancing (Part One of 1,000,000)

by Joe Wallace

Here we go–a series of posts that breaks it all down by the numbers–how to start a freelancing career in 1,000,000 easy steps.

Freelancing is a journey that never ends–unless you give up and find something else to do with your time. I have so many people asking me on a weekly basis that I figured it’s high time to start dispensing some helpful information from the ground up. So if you’re reading this, lucky soon-to-be-freelancer, congratulations–this is the first step in a very long and profitable journey.

Away we go.

Let’s start with the simplest of simple basics. In order to begin freelancing you need a basic set of tools to do the work. I don’t mean SKILLS, we’ll assume you have some rudimentary understanding of how to write (Subject, object, verb, noun, etc.). Like any money making venture, you need gear and resources to get your work rolling. A carpenter has her saws, hammers, screwdrivers and drills. A doctor has surgical knives, an operating table, etc.

A freelancer needs the following:

A computer equipped with Word. No, Word is NOT required, but this is the software that 99.999% of the editors in my experience will use to read your work. OR they will use something that is Word-compatible. You can use any program you like as long as you can save your documents in a Microsoft Word “Compatibility Mode” formatted document.If you don’t know what compatibility mode is, you will soon learn–we’ll cover that in a different post.

A RELIABLE Internet connection. Don’t be held hostage to the sporadic hours of that free Internet connection if you can help it. You’re going to need to be able to research, write and submit at any time day or night.

A reliable phone connection. Freelancers should be available to do their business at any time they can grab five minutes to coordinate, negotiate, interview or be interviewed. It’s a mistake in the long term to rely on those pay-as-you-go cell phones, borrowed phone lines or other temporary solutions. You’re building a business and if you need to develop a steady income to afford a cell phone line or home phone, try to keep your time spent on borrowed phone time as minimal as possible–get your own professional gear!

Once you have these three tools, you can truly launch your career. You’ll be able to get on line and in touch with editors, fellow freelancers and your sources at will. Some may think this first entry in our ongoing series is far too basic, but it’s my mission in life to outline the freelance journey in excessive detail–some people genuinely don’t realize they NEED their own phone and Internet connection in order to get started.

It’s easy to assume you can use that free wi-fi connection at the local library or the phone at Mom’s place to do some freelance business in the early days–until you get a tight deadline for a paying gig you really want and find yourself in dire need of a set of long-distance phone calls and online research just at the wrong time. Hence the very basic start to our series. … Continue Reading

Almost Famous

Freelance-Zone.com is proud to welcome Jake Poinier, founder/owner of Boomvang Creative Group. We’re excited to have Jake sharing his wisdom here at FZ. When you’re done reading Almost Famous, be sure to check out his advice at Dear Dr. Freelance, you’ll be glad you did.

When my son Nick was seven or eight years old, he asked, “Dad, are you a famous writer?”

Knowing that his frame of reference was JK Rowling, I confessed that, no, I’m not a famous writer. I explained that I get paid to write for businesses, millions of people have read my magazine articles (some of them interviews with famous people), used web sites I’ve provided content for, and listened to radio ads or watched videos I’ve scripted.

The answer seemed to satisfy him, and it’s a moment I think about a lot. There are a thousand reasons and ways to be a freelance writer/editor, and surely fame is a long shot, particularly if that’s not what you set out to achieve. Basically, I went full-time freelance in 1999 to escape a soul-crushing 7-to-7 publishing job.

Supporting a mortgage, a stay-at-home wife, two toddlers and a bear-sized black Lab, on my own terms and time, was a revelation. More than a decade later, my wife has a job, the kids are in middle school, and we’re now on Lab #2—and I love what I do more than ever.

Which brings me to this: I’m thrilled and honored to step up from regular commenter to regular contributor here at Freelance-Zone.com. In two weeks, I’ll dig into the numbers from my annual Freelance Forecast (free download here: http://deardrfreelance.com), which surveys hundreds of freelancers and their clients about money, relationships, what works and what doesn’t. Till then, take a minute to share what motivates you most: fame, fortune, or something else entirely.

Jake Poinier is the founder/owner of Boomvang Creative Group, the “man behind the mask” at the newly launched advice blog for freelancers, Dear Dr. Freelance, and a ruminator on assorted business topics at Jake’s Take.

Poll: What’s On Your Mind?

by Joe Wallace

After much discussion today about all things freelance, Catherine and I realized that there’s an important part of the freelance puzzle we’d like to spend a lot more time on in these posts.

While most freelancers know it’s far better to work for yourself then somebody else, there’s always a nagging doubt in the minds of even the best freelancers out there. “Can I really make it?” or “Will I really find enough work to justify going freelance full time?”

Cath and I say yes to both of these questions, but it’s obvious that there are plenty of unknowns out there for those still part-timing it in the freelance world. And that’s why we are asking you, dear reader, to send us your questions about the freelance life. We want to know what we can do to help.What is it you want to know? What’s your burning question about freelancing? What do you want to see given more coverage on here?

Send your questions about any and all aspects of the freelance life to:

questions@freelance-zone.com

We’re soliciting questions for two reasons–we want to know what’s on your mind, and we want to use your questions to guide future content here on FZ. It does us no good to endlessly pontificate on subjects that don’t mean anything to you personally–consider this your open invitation to influence future posts here–we won’t hold back on the answers, either. Sharing is a good thing.

If you’ve read this blog for any amount of time, you know Cath and I have many years of experience in this business, and we’ve come as far as we have via trial and error, calculated risks, wild speculation and every tactic in between. How can we help you? Drop us a line and we’ll do our level best.

We don’t promise to have all the answers, and in the end what worked for us might not work for you–but we can at least share what we have. We look forward to the first round.

Stretch Out, Stay Flexible

Greetings Freelancers! I am an editor but I come in peace!

Let me introduce myself. My name is Amanda and I’ve been a professional editor and a writer for seven years. I’ve run the spectrum when it comes to the writing and editing industry, from my early days as a music journalist to the more recent corporate world of B2B copy editing and I’ve lived to tell the tale. Currently, I spend my days as a Community Manager for RunMyErrand (a start-up based out of Boston) creating marketing strategies on Facebook, Twitter and YouTube, which is a fancy way of saying I screw around on-line all day and get paid. Woot!

But I digress. You, reader, come to this valuable blog site to learn how to make it in this tough and unforgiving industry, and to that I have but one piece of advice for you: Be flexible.

Within the writing and editing industry, the opportunities for job growth and change are constantly appearing, disappearing and reinventing themselves. Who knew when Facebook first popped up that there would be lucrative marketing opportunities on-line for nearly every company in the world? Who knew that Twitter would become such a powerful beast in terms of information sharing and driving website traffic? Who could have guessed that blogging would become the bread and butter for so many wonderful writers to launch careers?

… Continue Reading

Avoiding the Paper Bin

by Mike O’Mary

Dream of Things has a Fan Page on Facebook, and a while back, somebody left a message for me on the Dream of Things wall: “Ever time try write storys use go in paper bin because stoys not at good.”

At first, I didn’t know what to say. But I thought about it, and then I wrote back: “I think I understand. I have days like that, too.”

Actually, I have a lot of days like that, and recently I kind of hit a wall. Which is why this post is about taking care of yourself and making sure you get plenty of rest and relaxation.

I hit a wall mentally and physically after four months of working 70-80 hours a week. I launched a new publishing company and online bookstore, published two books, started soliciting submissions for 15 anthologies of creative nonfiction, recruited and retained seven editors to edit those 15 anthologies, started contributing to The Freelance Zone, and began editing two book-length manuscripts. And that was in my spare time because I also have a day job. This past weekend, I couldn’t think any more. So I took the weekend off. I went for a walk on Saturday, then spent the afternoon cleaning out my closets, trying on old pants (I had somehow accummulated about 40 pairs of pants) and setting aside anything that didn’t fit for donation to charity. Then Sunday afternoon, I went to the Green Mill in Chicago for some live jazz and to celebrate my girlfriend’s birthday. It was a much-needed break.

When I was freelancing, one of the things I found most challenging was battling the feeling that I could never completely relax. I always felt I needed to be looking for the next assignment, and I never told a client “no” because I never knew when the client might call again. But relaxation is critical to your well-being. Otherwise, it is very difficult to do the very demanding work of writing and editing. So turn off that laptop, put on some music and try on some pants (or try on whatever you like to try on to relax), and live today so you can write again tomorrow.

Mike O’Mary is founding dreamer of Dream of Things, an independent book publisher currently accepting creative nonfiction stories for anthologies on 15 topics.

Writing…See All The Possibilities

by Catherine L. Tully

There are many ways to develop your income stream as a freelance writer. You can do it all by writing…or you can share some of your knowledge with others. When you get to a certain point in your career, teaching and speaking become a possibility for those who would like to diversify a bit.

Both Joe and I have spoken at writing-related conferences and panels–and have been paid to do so. You have to have some decent “clout” to do it, but if you are able to, it’s a great way to pad out your income a bit. It’s also a great way to network. Plus, it’s fun–and sometimes you even get to travel!

Teaching is also a great opportunity. You can share what you know about freelancing with others–and make some money in the process. Joe and I recently taught a freelance writing seminar in the Chicagoland area and are scheduled to do another one this summer. We have also moved into the social media realm, and will be teaching a class on that as well in July.

The nice part about expanding your horizons a bit as you advance your career is that it keeps everything interesting. You are also able to give back to the writing community in a way that helps others move forward and take those first steps into the field. If you’ve been around a while, you may want to start exploring some of these options–they are really worth a look!

Confessions of an Editor: I Hate Training

by Joe Wallace

I admit it…when I think about training new people to do detail-oriented, non-writing techie stuff like managing WordPress, resizing images in Photoshop, or the finer points of troubleshooting buggy FTP interfaces, I start hearing the Godzilla movie music in my head–that ominous, doomy music that lets you know things are about to go very wrong, very soon.

I share this because for the first time in YEARS, I am on the other end of the lesson. I’m learning a whole new universe of WYSIWYG editing platform issues, file management system pitfalls and hiccups, even where to send the copy corrections is a new and special headache for the uninitiated. Whatever happened to e-mail?

But if you stay on an upwardly mobile career path long enough, you’ll probably encounter similar training needs that put you in the teacher’s seat at least long enough to teach somebody else what to do in case you go on vacation and need someone else to upload your content for the day/week/year.

Why do I hate training? Because inevitably, whether I’m the teacher or the learner, some critical piece of information gets left out of the equation due to human nature–one that becomes absolutely essential once the trainer is gone and no longer of any assistance.

Calling Mister Murphy…your law is being invoked on aisle seven.

What can you do to prevent this from happening? … Continue Reading

Run Your Freelance Career Like a Business: Advertise

by Joe Wallace

Why is the business card in the picture above blank? Believe it or not, that’s how a lot of freelancers treat themselves. Instead of running their freelance careers like a business, they squander their energies with little or no direction.

To survive in business you must do three things:

1. Offer good products or services at a competitive price.

2. Be active in the community where you want to do business.

3. Advertise and promote your brand.

A lot of freelancers get the first two right but fall down on the job when it comes to #3, promoting your brand. I can hear some now saying, “But I already have a Twitter account and a Facebook page!”

Twitter and Facebook are inded critical parts of the puzzle. But take a look at any successful business today and you’ll see how they approach social media is more of a means to an end when it comes to PR and self-promotion–not the end itself.

Your self-promotion efforts should include Twitter and Facebook, but consider them to be communication channels instead of billboard advertising. What’s the difference?

Twitter and Facebook are seldom used (successfully) to actually SELL things. They’re most effective when used to make connections, network, and inform. People are leery of the hard sell on social media. But when was the last time you heard anyone complaining that a billboard or radio ad sales pitch was too self-serving? … Continue Reading